A Gardeners Forum Forums Members History Forum Life 2005 Pest exclusion

I have a problem with cabbage moth larvae on broccoli and other brassicas. I planted a few seedlings out today and decided to construct a bit of a safehouse for them. I used a double bed mozzie net and some old polypipe offcuts. No bugs and no sprays.
Here's a pic. Hopethe idea is useful to someone else as i know it works for keeping fruitfly out of tomatoes.

http://photobucket.com/albums/v239/m.longstaff/?action=view&current=DSC01245.jpg

Does anyone else have any similar ideas to share?

Well...I don't know about ideas...but I was going to look at a "few" of your pics and ended up sitting here eeeewwiing & aauugghhing over every one of them! I may show up on your doorstep for about a months stay...your place just looks like paradise!!!! How beautiful...okay, I'm jealous!!!!!

I second Vanessa, Langy - your place is paradise! And I have not seen an orchid so beautiful as the one in pic #33. What kind is it? Definitely an addition to my "must have" list.

Um. Thanks. Paradise? Nah. Not due for that yet. It's just a collection of soil with goodstuff being stuffed into it at any and every opportunity. Amazing what jumps out of the soil. Thanks for your observations.
The orchid was an unlabelled gift. Sorry. I'll look into it further and see what i can find out. It is a cracker though !
Oh if you want to visit for a month, that's OK too. Just bring yer workboots OK;)

You betcha I'll bring my boots...that would be FUN not work. Cricket was right about the orchid...just beautimous! Even your birds...(what is the one sitting by the beer?)
Well Longy, all I can say is that the stuff that jumps out of my soil doesn't quite look like that. You are a wonderful gardener and landscaper...we could all use some lessons from you. Thank you again for sharing those pics....and any more you have.....

The bird with the beer is a kookaburra.
Unless you mean Mrs Longy;)
Oh and they're not my birds. they're wild birds on a good thing. Provide water and shelter and they'll be there. Best pest eaters in the business.

So that's what a kookaburra looks like! Made me start humming that tune about the kookaburra sitting in the ol' gum tree!!!!

"Unless you mean Mrs Longy;)"

Uh, Uh...nope...wouldn't EVER say anything about Mrs. Longy!!! I'm not big enough to defend myself!!!! <img border="0" alt="[tongue]" title="" src="graemlins/tongue.gif" />

Kookabura

OMG...what a neat pic! Is that in your backyard Mr. Bill?

No, unfortunately... Kookaburas are from Australia,
I took that pix on one of my trips trips to the zoo.

Nice!!! I especially like the butterfly!

Longy I had to pop in after looking at your album AGAIN LOL You are DA BOMB (it's a good thing Longy LOL) and my super gardening hero!

I am in awe at your lemon tree...only in my DREAMS! Oh, and your greenhouse with the ferns...just awesome. Thanks for sharing!

LOL. Thanx Mary. Funnily enough i just cut all the limbs off my lemon tree and savaged the roots off and moved it to a new location with a bobcat. This is how it looks now
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v239/m.longstaff/a608efe7.jpg
It was crowding out my lime, orange and mandarine trees. (That's them in the background). It's fine though. It has punched out a few new leaves and is waiting for spring. I can feel the life still in it. We're just into winter now. You can tell by how cold it looks right:) The day i took those fotos, i had to wear a shirt it was so cold.

LOL Poor guy had to wear a shirt!

My stomach flipped when I saw that skeleton of the lemon tree! LOL! I'm glad it's still alive though, it was beautiful, and I would so love to be able to grow lemons. Mmmmmm!

I forgot it was winter there, and it didn't even dawn on my why you had lemons in the winter LOL Yaknow the sun revolves around southern illinois for me sometimes

We get the main crop of citrus hanging on the trees in the early winter. Two to three crops a year. My lime tree is in constant fruit. The only oranges i get are the winter crop because of fruit fly damage in the other crop. Bastards. I did cover the tree with mosquito netting but it's too big these days. I'm not home enough to maintain a strict (organic) spraying programme so i just accept the loss. My mandarine is under strict instructions to do better with the reduced competition from the lemon. We'll see. (It may suffer a worse fate if not;) I also have lemonade citrus, a young tree which is producing its first full crop, mango, avocado, pawpaw, mulberry, cherry guava, lychee, 2 types of passionfruit, green table grapes, brown turkey fig, red bananas, and some bush tucker plants such as Davidsons plum, grummichumma, rose apple and cluster fig. Yummo. My chooks patrol the area underneath and help keep the pests and weeds down as well as fertilising as they go. So my trees pretty much care for themselves now. Apart from those rotten fruitfly.